When the late Richard Nixon made his historic trip to Beijing in 1972, White Rabbit sweets were at the centre of the table for his state dinner with premier Zhou Enlai . The sweets were presented to the US president as a state gift and were, without doubt, made to the highest quality. How far this great national brand has fallen!
Almost a week after Singapore and then Hong Kong detected the industrial chemical melamine in the famous confectionery, the maker, Guan Sheng Yuan Food, reluctantly agreed yesterday to stop selling it on the mainland. An export ban was imposed earlier. But the company would not label its latest action as a product recall, leaving open the possibility that the sweets could be left on the shelves in some places and therefore remain available to customers. This is not the way a responsible company should act.
The company's parent is the Shanghai Guangming Dairy and Food Company, which is its main supplier and one of the major milk producers caught up in the melamine-tainted milk scandal. Given the fact that milk powder comprises 45 per cent of White Rabbit's ingredients, it should have recalled all its products from the start. After all, most of those who eat its sweets are children. But initially, Guan Sheng Yuan Food said it needed to wait for test results from the Shanghai Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau before making a decision. It changed its mind after public pressure. If mainland companies want to compete on the global stage, they must learn to act quickly and responsibly to protect their lifeblood, the consumer.
The logo with a jumping and smiling rabbit was once the pride of Maoist China. It was one of the few export products that was politically correct enough to survive and even thrive during the Cultural Revolution. Unlike their current dairy-heavy diet, most people on the mainland used to be so poor that their only milk intake was from eating the sweets. The nation, in the intervening years, has advanced in leaps and bounds.
Today, it is a global industrial powerhouse; three Chinese astronauts are, at this moment, circling the Earth. Yet, the made-in-China label has fallen into disrepute around the world. It used to mean cheap and affordable goods. Now, rightly or wrongly, many mainland products are perceived as being potentially dangerous. The melamine-tainted milk scandal is the latest in a string of defective products and contaminated foods that has raised serious doubt about the reliability and safety of the mainland's consumer products. So far, 53,000 mainland children have been made ill by the industrial chemical and four killed. Many have developed kidney stones and other renal problems. Five cases have also emerged in Hong Kong.
Such scandals are not isolated incidents. They threaten the nation's economic future. It simply would not do to have the World Health Organisation and the European Commission rounding on Beijing for the lack of safety and standards. A nation that can send astronauts into space - perhaps soon to the moon - must be capable of making more prosaic consumer products that meet world standards down here on Earth. It's time to work hard to restore the made-in-China brand so we can be proud of it once again.
